To Fall Apart and Fall Back Together
by Lysa-uk
Summary: Xander's miserable, Willow's angry. How will it end?
1. Chapter One

Title: To Fall Apart and Fall Back Together

Author: Lysa-uk

Rating: T

Feedback: As always, to Ask and it's yours.

Pairing: Willow/Xander

Summary: Xander's miserable, Willow's angry. How will it end?

Spoilers: Season 3

Disclaimer: I don't own these characters, but if I did… They belong to Joss Whedon/Mutant Enemy/UPN and everyone else. No copyright is intended.

Notes: This is kind of a long one, so I apologise now. It's set in the same time frame as 'The Wish', there are a few references to things that occurred in that episode, but if there are any mistakes…I don't really care. It's just something I've been wanting to write for a while, but it kind of took me a while. NC-17 version of this is available on request.

Dedication: To 'Locke', because you've helped me so much, not just with this fic, but my others, too. Plus, you kind of requested this, so I'm blaming you for everything. Sorry if it's not what you had in mind.

* * *

Xander Harris was in a bad mood.

He lay on his bed, his room darkened with the fading sunlight outside that was swiftly turning into night, his curtains closed to the outside world. One arm was folded behind his head, lending itself as a cushion, while the other bounced a tennis ball on the wall opposite from him. He wasn't sure whether it was helping him think more clearly, or if it was distracting him from his thoughts. Either way, it didn't matter. His head was a spinning. Not literally, though. No, he had seen it happening to some weird demon thing on patrol once, and it hadn't been fun. He meant figuratively, and he supposed that the repetitive motion wasn't really likely to help matters. But, he reasoned to himself, at least it couldn't make them worse. He hoped. Or maybe was just jinxing the hell out of himself. It wasn't like it would be the first time.

He knew it was his own fault, really. Everything was, if his father was to be believed, but this time it really was true. Okay, so maybe he hadn't been the only one to blame, but he should have seen something like this coming. But then, he never had been the sharpest stake in the weapons chest.

He shook his head to himself, a sigh of frustration escaping him and disappearing in the stagnant air of his room. He had been lying here for the past few hours, ever since he got home from school that day, looking thoughtful and trying to come up with some kind of ingenius solution to the problem. Of course, his mind didn't want to cooperate, not that it usually did anyway. He was just finding it even harder than usual to keep his mind from wandering into forbidden territory, and it just so happened that territory included his best friend and a few not-so-innocent moments from the past few weeks.

He felt like crap, and the country music playing from the stereo situated across the room from him was doing nothing to sooth and distract him. A part of him knew that nothing would do that, not even the dulcet tones from the music of pain that usually made him feel like his life was a peach compared to the traumas described by some of the singers he was used to listening to, but he figured it was worth a shot.

It had been just over a week since he and Willow had been caught red-handed - or, more appropriately, red-lipped - in the factory. He simply thought of it now as 'when my life went down the toilet', which was ironic because that was the only time in his entire life that he had felt absolutely certain about anything.

Xander decided that he hated irony.

No one would have thought that loyal and try-hard Xander Harris would cheat on his beautiful, popular girlfriend with someone else, especially not with good and innocent Willow Rosenberg. But he had.

And he couldn't help but be happy about that, in some strange and weird way, because in those few moments they had shared he had felt more than he ever had for anyone else.

Which brought up the pangs of guilt about Cordelia.

There was no denying that he had always been attracted to Cordelia, so he wouldn't even try. Cordelia was beautiful and confident and she was like a flame that he couldn't help but keep going back to, that kept drawing him in like a moth with no will of its own. Their encounters had begun on a purely physical level, even if they hadn't understood it at the time. It had been hot and new, and there was something between them that neither of them could have predicted. That first kiss between them was like a bolt out of the blue for the both of them. Twelve years of arguing, put-downs, snide comments and mutual dislike, and suddenly they found themselves kissing in Buffy's basement, and everywhere they could after then without being seen. It was like there were two different Cordelia's, the one she used as a façade in public, and the one she became when it was just the two of them, and he was glad that he was the one she chose to share that with. As time went on, their relationship progressed, and he was happy with that. He was happy with her. Why wouldn't he be?

Willow was why.

The first few days of the past week had been spent with trips to and from the hospital, even though Cordelia refused to see him. He'd sit in the hall, nurses looking at him inquisitively as he tried to catch a glimpse of his ex-girlfriend when people were coming and going from the room just opposite him. When she left the hospital, he hung around outside of her house, so much so that her parents had actually told him he had to let her recuperate, and that she'd call him when she was ready. He guessed they didn't know what he had done, mostly because his nose was left unbroken and his eye unblackened, and judging by the size of her father, that was definitely a good thing.

What he tried **not** to do was spend time with Willow, which was impossible when they had a sneaky mutual friend who was a vampire slayer and well-versed in acts of deception. She'd called and asked him to meet her, neglecting to mention that Willow would be there with her hair and her eyes and her lips, and he'd managed to fall for the same trick three times in the week, which he thought was maybe a personal best for him in the stupidity stakes. It wasn't that he didn't want to see Willow because, god, he really did. He just couldn't. If he saw her, there was the very real possibility that she would see the nervousness in his face, the way his hands shook and the way he felt about her in his eyes. He couldn't risk that, not ever.

But he knew that she wanted to know why their fluke had happened, and he wished he could talk to her and get it over with, just so he could lie his way out of it and put a stop to it all. He could see it in the way she'd stare at him, expectantly and curiously, but she had left him in no doubt at the Bronze when she'd told him that all of her parts were for Oz, so he wasn't going to fool himself there was any chance at all and therefore didn't see the point in confessing anything that could strain their relationship further.

But he was left wondering about that night in the hospital and what he'd told her when she was in the coma. He had never said those words aloud to anyone and actually meant it as much as he had right then. But still, when she had woken up and asked for Oz, he felt grateful more than anything else. One second of hurt, sure, when he realised that it wasn't him that she was asking for, but mostly thankful. He was grateful that he could go back to being his normal self, that his life wouldn't change forever if she had known what he had said, but mostly just happy that she was alive and kicking, because that made everything else alright. The words he had said to her that night were something he always told himself was fear. His fear of losing her that made him say anything that might keep her with him for just a little while longer. He told himself that he would have done anything to save her, but when she had woken up he didn't fool himself it was because of his words or what he felt.

No, that would be down to Oz. She woke up because she thought he was the one sitting by her bed and holding her hand and spilling his heart all over the pale blue hospital bedspread, turning it blood-red with his words. Even if it wasn't medically possible, he still believed that had a major part in her recovery. Not that he was bitter about that. Really.

He had absolutely no right to be jealous of Oz, he knew that. But he was. He had been ever since the werewolf had first started paying attention to his best friend. He'd never admit it to anyone, but he was afraid that Oz was taking her away from him. She had been the one who was there through everything while he had been growing up. She was the only one he knew he could count on. She was the only person he trusted absolutely and completely. He wanted her to be happy, but did it really have to be with Oz?

Okay. So maybe he was a little bitter.

It was the little things that got to Xander at first. The way she'd smile at Oz the way she used to smile at him. The way he was suddenly all she could talk about. How he was the guy who she told everything to. But then he'd find his eyes fixed on the way they'd hold hands underneath the table in the library so no one else could see. The way she'd blush under his utterly besotted gaze. The way her lips crinkled when he kissed them. Whenever he felt that envy turning his face green, he fought it by reaching over and taking his girlfriend's hand if she was there, or by making his excuses and leaving so he could call her and let her rant to him about some new store that had just opened up in the mall, or about how Harmony had made an idiot of herself in front of some hot guy on the football team, just so he could fool himself that he wasn't the worst boyfriend in the whole world, even if the pangs of guilt in his stomach told him otherwise.

So he pushed that night away, left it behind when he left the hospital that night because Willow was okay and that was the only thing that mattered. He carried on with life as normal, missing Cordelia when she was on vacation and hanging out with Oz and Willow who tried not to be too coupley around him, just to be polite. He told himself that he was okay with that, really, and he'd lived in that deluded state for a good few months.

But then there had been that 'wow' moment when he'd looked at her that night, bathed in light and life. He was sure she thought he was just being his usual, hormonal self when he'd seen her in that dress looking completely different, but it wasn't…**just** that. It played a big part, and he was ready to admit that, but it wasn't everything. He knew that if she'd stepped out from behind that screen in her overalls and a fuzzy sweater, he would have felt exactly the same.

Was it possible that you could know someone for all of your life, see them everyday and talk to them every night, but just look at them for one second and feel your life change because of it?

The answer was apparently yes.

He had never wanted or expected to cheat on Cordelia. That was forever the last thing on his mind, because who would want to? He knew that half the guys at school would have killed to be dating Cordelia Chase, some of them literally, so why wasn't that enough to stop him from kissing Willow that night in her room?

After that first kiss he had told himself that it didn't mean anything, that curiosity got the better of him and he gave in and that any guy would have done the same in his position. But then he had seen her again the next day at school, and it was an entirely different matter. When he was with Willow, he felt his heart race and his mind go blank and his palms getting sweaty and his stomach flip, and he knew there was no way he could stop it. The fact was, he hadn't wanted it to stop. Not then, and not now.

Memories of that night at the hospital had kept creeping up on him since then. It was something that he always found himself thinking of at the most inappropriate times, like when Cordelia was curled up in his arms when they were watching a movie, or when he was supposed to be taking a pop quiz in one of his lessons. He had forced himself into believing those feelings weren't real for so long, but what he hadn't expected was his feelings to grow and develop since he had experienced what it was like to kiss her.

He certainly didn't expect to be lying on his bed one day, listening to country music because he realised he was in love with his best friend.

Oh, no. His life wasn't complicated. Not at all.


	2. Chapter Two

Willow Rosenberg was pissed off.

She stood at the window of her bedroom, parting the blinds to look out at the sky and the half-crescent moon that was just beginning to form. Looking at the moon, in any of its stages, usually made her feel closer to Oz, somehow. He was linked so intrinsically to the lunar cycle, and that in turn made her feel comforted when he wasn't with her. All she'd have to do is look out and see that silvery glow, and she'd be reassured that he was somewhere under the same moon.

Looking at the moon tonight, she had never felt further away from him.

No one would have thought that sweet, sensible Willow Rosenberg would cheat on her equally as sweet and cool boyfriend with someone else, especially not with doesn't-even-know-where-his-own-head-is Xander Harris. But she had.

It had been just over a week since the 'accident'. That being when she had given in to temptation when she swore to herself she never would again and kissed Xander on a bed in a deserted factory and then got caught by their respective partners. When she thought of it like that, it was more like a big, honking car wreck of a disaster than it was an 'oops, I spilt my milk' kind of accident.

She had gone through all the emotions possible for a human being, and quite a few that she was sure alien life-forms had invented, just to derive pleasure from her pain. The first thing being guilt. Humongous, nausea-inducing guilt when she had seen Oz's face when he had been standing in that doorway with Cordelia. Then came denial, when she tucked herself into bed every night since it had happened and told herself that it wasn't real, that it wasn't her fault. There was sadness, like when she saw Oz at school earlier and he had looked so… When Oz displayed emotion, that was the time to be afraid. And she had been afraid. She was afraid that Oz would always look at her with that devastation in his eyes, that he'd never talk to her again, and that she'd feel this badly for all of eternity. She was scared that she had wrecked her life totally and completely with something that had felt so amazingly… No, she wasn't even going to get into that.

And now she was just plain pissed off.

One week. One whole week, and Xander hadn't said a word to her about it. The first few days she understood. Cordelia was in the hospital, and Xander was visiting her to make sure she was okay – well, as okay as she could be after having a steel pole impaled through her midsection, anyway. He had wanted to apologise to Cordelia, and she got that, really, because that's what she was trying to do with Oz. She had been hanging around outside of the Osborne's house when he hadn't answered any of her calls, waiting outside of Devon's garage when she knew the band would be practising until Devon had threatened to call the police if she didn't leave. So she knew the need he had to explain his actions to her.

But how could he explain his actions to Cordelia when he hadn't even discussed them with her? How could Cordelia possibly even begin to understand what she hadn't witnessed for herself, when Willow clearly didn't, and she had been there the whole time?

Cordelia didn't want to understand, she had made that clear. She saw it as it was: Xander had cheated, therefore he was dumped, no explanation necessary. Willow just kind of hoped Oz didn't see it the same way.

Then Cordelia had been allowed home and Xander had been told to keep his distance by her parents while she was recovering, although how the constant phone calls he kept making to her private line entered into that equation, Willow wasn't quite sure. She herself had spent a lot of time with Buffy, more out of safety than anything else. Alone, she worried and panicked and fretted, but with Buffy she was reminded that at least she didn't sleep with Oz, have him go evil and try to kill all of their friends before she had to stick a sword through him to send him to hell and stop the world from ending, thus proving worse things could happen. Which was a plus.

She and Xander had always talked about everything, so naturally she had expected to discuss this with him, in some way, at least. But…nothing. Not when they had all met up to patrol a few nights ago, or when they had gone on a picnic-turned-demon-extermination at the weekend.

What was worse was that he couldn't even look at her. He couldn't make eye contact, like he was so ashamed of what they did, and not just because of the infidelity thing. It was like he was sorry that he had even gone near her all of those times, like he couldn't believe he had done something so awful. He was the only one who could possibly understand what she was feeling, and he wouldn't even look at her.

She moved back from the window, looking to her side and seeing her profile in the mirror a few feet away. Okay, so she didn't look too great right now in old jeans and an old shirt, but was she really that terrible? Was she really that bad that Xander would feel ashamed of himself for kissing her?

The few times they had been around Buffy they were okay. They could communicate via the slayer in a roundabout way that none of them wanted to admit or acknowledge. The closest he had come to talking about it was making a comment about how it would never happen ever again, and what was she supposed to do, ask him why it happened in the first place in front of their friend so they could make things even more awkward? At the Bronze, they had been left alone for a few minutes while Buffy was getting refreshments, and it was the closest they had been to being friends again. Although, she had to admit she had kind of ruined that moment herself when he had touched her hand and she had told him there had to be a strict no-touching policy between them. But she'd had to say that because she could hardly tell him that when he had touched her hand, she felt everything… Again with the not thinking of that.

But he hadn't said a word. She needed explanations, reasons, a flipchart and graph if he could possibly provide them. She needed to know why, after all of this time, he had suddenly seen her as more than best-friend-Willow, or she who was a guy friend who knew about girl stuff as he'd so eloquently named her a few years back.

She had waited, quite patiently, she had thought, for him to come and knock on her door late one night with that cute, little boy lost way that he had because he thought that maybe they should talk, or even call her so they could figure out a way to solve all of this mess that they had managed to create. But no, he was acting like he had that time a couple of years ago when she'd found that stack of Playboys under his bed. He hadn't been able to look at her for weeks without his cheeks turning a brighter shade of red than her hair, which Jesse had thought was just hilarious. There was no Jesse to laugh at them now.

She needed resolution. Was that too much to ask for? He had known her their whole lives, and he didn't know that she couldn't leave things up in the air like this by now? Had he even been paying attention?

She couldn't do this. She couldn't just carry on the way they were going, a division building between them more and more each day. She knew why she had kissed him that night – and those times after – although she'd never admit them to anyone else if she could help it. But why had he?

During those times with him, she could have sworn that she had seen something in his eyes that she'd never seen before. She could have sworn that he had looked at her like she had always dreamt that he would, and she had liked that. More than liked, she had… Let's not continue with that sentence.

How can it be that those things could just disappear in the blink of an eye? Guilt did terrible things to people, she knew that because she was living it. In her heart, she knew she was just the unattainable target, the current crush that Xander was known for having on every other girl in the world, but she had to hear that from him. She had to hear him say those words out loud, because even after everything, she still l… Not going there.

She understood if it was just a hormone thing. He was an eighteen year old guy and she knew that didn't exactly leave him in the best position to make judgements concerning lustful encounters with someone other than his girlfriend. But if he told her that she could move on. If he told her that he was just curious, she'd say okay and walk away, probably a little heartbroken, but still.

She had to know, because then she could move on with her life, and moving on was something she definitely needed to do.

She was sitting on her bed and slipping her sneakers on before she knew what she was doing.

She was tired of the passive, scared, shy little Willow she saw herself as. She had questions, and by Goddess, he was going to give her answers, whether he liked it or not. She needed to be someone different, if only for tonight, if only for the next hour. She was going to be forward and aggressive and say exactly what she meant. She felt empowered, and free, and…well, frankly, terrified. But that was a good thing. She could feel the adrenalin rushing around her body, making her tingle and shake as she tried to tie her shoelaces.

Whatever happened tonight, she had a feeling it would change things forever.


	3. Chapter Three

Xander heard the distant sound of the front door opening, heard voices that he couldn't distinguish but didn't try too hard to listen to, and the ball that had been bouncing sat still in his palm. He heard the door clicking closed, and then footsteps. He didn't pay too much attention to it, not really caring right now if his parents had invited the friendly neighbourhood gang of vampires into their home and happily pointed the way to their burden-of-a-son's room for the price of a bottle of peppermint schnapps.

There was a tap on his bedroom door that he could barely hear over the music that was playing, even though the volume had been on low since his mother had come up and asked him to turn it down about an hour ago. He looked at the door thoughtfully, wondering who it could be. His mom would be yelling at him to let her in by now. His father wouldn't have bothered knocking at all, usually favouring barging in, telling him that knocking was for women and that it was his house so he'd do what he'd like.

The tap came again, low and hardly audible.

"Yeah?" he called.

He struggled to think who it could be. There was hardly a multitude of people who wanted to see him lately. Buffy - who hadn't been in his room since that incident when he had accidentally let slip about a certain dream he had once. Cordelia – like that would ever happen, unless this was some Bizarro alternate universe. And the only other person who had ever been in his room willingly was…

The door opened, and he couldn't have been more surprised to see the person standing behind it.

…Willow.

She stood there, one hand still on the door handle and one hand on the doorjamb. She wore an old pair of jeans that he had spilt blue paint on about a year or so ago when they had been painting his room. And by spilt, he meant that he had thrown it at her and a paint fight had ensued. He could still see the stain on her right thigh, even though the jeans had probably been washed about a million times since then, and she wore an old, too-big white shirt of her fathers that she usually just wore around the house.

He could feel his fist clenching around the tennis ball, squeezing it so hard it made his fingers hurt. Her face was flushed, like she had been running. Or possibly making out with someone, because he remembered that was how she looked after he'd kissed her and how it had made him feel so unbelievably…

Okay, that was probably not what he should be focusing on right now.

Her hair was pulled behind her ears, the red hue looking darker in the dim light of his room, but her eyes were wide and kind of different to what they usually were, and for some reason he was a little afraid of her.

He had a feeling this wasn't going to go well.

"Hey," she said with a strangely agitated look on her face, her hand twisting the door handle nervously.

"Hey," he said back, propping himself up on his elbows.

"Your, uh, your parents let me in on their way out," she explained.

"Yeah, their weekly 'getting drunk with Rory' thing," he nodded, reaching for the lamp at the side of the bed and flicking it on, leaving the tennis ball there, low lighting filling the darkening room and making him blink against it while his eyes got used to the change.

"They told me to just come up," she said. "Can I come in?" she asked, nervously biting down on her bottom lip, and looking like it was a very real possibility that he would maybe say no.

"Yeah, sure," he said quickly, sitting up, watching as she closed the door behind her. He had expected her to maybe sit at the desk because she was the only person who had ever sat there since his parents had bought it from a second-hand store when he had started high school, and it wasn't like it ever got used for homework. Or, if he was pushing his luck, maybe she'd sit on the bed, if she could get to it through the miles of distance he felt there was between them. Then again, after the thoughts that had been running through his head lately – a lot of them including him, her and a nice, comfy bed - it was probably a good thing that she didn't.

She walked over to the window, peeking out of the curtains a little, before she went over to the stereo, her finger tracing the smooth surface of the display, before she lifted her finger to her face to inspect the dust particles gathered there.

"Is, uh, everything okay?" he asked suspiciously.

"Yeah," she said as she walked back to the door, her finger wiping itself clean on her shirt, then back to the stereo, and he already knew what she was doing. Pacing. A time-honoured tradition among the thoughtful and frustrated. "I just feel kinda—"

"Wound up like a tightly coiled spring and you're about to pop at someone or you might explode?"

"Something like that," she told him. "How did you know?"

"Recognise the signs," he said with a shrug. "You look tired."

"That's because I am," she answered.

"I guess I don't blame you."

"You look confused," she told him.

"I always look confused," he said.

"Well…yeah," she allowed. "But…more so."

"It's just…" he said quietly, "I guess I'm—"

"Wondering why I'm here?" she finished for him.

"Well, yeah," he told her. "I mean, we haven't really—"

"What are we doing?" she asked suddenly, stopping the pacing and turning to look at him with more than a little confusion on her face and her hands on her hips.

"I don't know about you, but right now, I feel like you're about to ground me or something," he said suspiciously. "You have Mom-Face."

"I mean what's happening with us," she told him. "And, by the way, I wouldn't say something like that to someone who's kinda pissed off and in the process of developing witchcraft skills. Not really a compliment."

"You're pissed off?" he asked, confused. "At me?"

"Yes," she said. "At you."

"What did **I** do?" he asked, confused.

"It's more what you haven't done," she said.

"And that would be?"

"You've barely been able to look at me since all of this…stuff…happened," she told him, her hands waving around in the air. "I know you've been trying to act normal, Xander, but it's me, and I know you. I know it was tough for you with Cordelia in the hospital, and I feel bad about that, too, but the only person who knows how I'm feeling is you, and you won't talk to me."

"I **have** been talking to you," he argued.

"Asking me if it's 'tears of a clown' or 'grins of a sad person' doesn't really count," she informed him.

"You're the one who said you had to show Oz he was the one you wanted to be with," he told her. "I thought us keeping our distance would do that."

"I said that last night, Xander," she said sharply. "That doesn't explain the past week of non-verbalness between us. Besides," she muttered, "I don't think **anything** is going to do that."

"He's angry now, Will," he said. "But he'll come around. He cares about you too much."

"And what about you?" she asked, her head tilted and eyes accusing.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Willow," he said, standing up from the bed to stand near the window, concentrating his focus on the way the curtains had fallen apart so he could see just a little of the overgrown back yard because it was easier than looking at her. "Why are you acting like this?"

"Why shouldn't I act like this?" she asked.

"Because I'm about to get Giles on the phone and get him to come over here to perform an exorcism on my recently-crazy best friend."

"Best friend, huh?" she said bitterly, shaking her head. "I guess now I know how you feel about me. And, by the way, how am I acting crazy?" she said. "Because I'm standing up for myself and actually saying what's on my mind?"

"Well…yeah…" he said feebly, turning so he could look at her, not in the eye because that would be too hard, but just so she knew he was paying attention. "This isn't you, Will."

"Well, it's amazing what getting caught kissing my 'best friend' can do for you," she told him, air-quoting her words in a way that seemed to make him feel like she'd just stabbed him through the heart with a particularly blunt pair of scissors, the looks she was aiming at him twisting it over and over. "We need to talk."

"About what?" he snapped, still recoiling from her previous blow.

"Did you need a recap?" she asked him angrily. "I realise what happened between us didn't mean much to you, but I really didn't think that you would forget as quickly as this. That has to be a record, even for you."

"I didn't forget, okay?" he replied. "I just get why you want to pick this apart. I don't think there's anything to say."

"Why am I not surprised?" she said sarcastically.

"Do you want to explain to me where everything became my fault?" he asked. "Because I'm a little slow at catching on."

"You are a lot of things," she told him, her piercing green eyes seemingly accusing him of something, "But you're not as stupid as you make yourself out to be."

"You think?" he asked. "Because I have the report cards to prove otherwise."

"I **do** think," she said adamantly. "You can be thoughtless at times, and you can be immature, and you can say the wrong things at the wrong times…"

"But not stupid, huh?" he asked dryly, fixing her with a glare. "It's a shame. I could have had the set."

"Can you be quiet for just a minute?"

"I don't know," he said thoughtfully. "Let's try it."

"Xander, would you quit playing around?" she said suddenly, her voice sharp and stern. "This is our lives we're talking about here. What the hell happened to us?"

"Momentary lust?" he offered.

"And then…?" she asked.

"After effects?" he offered with a shrug. "Repeat performances?"

"You just can't quit with the joking, can you?"

"I think you've known me long enough to know the answer to that," he said with a bitter laugh.

"I'm trying to have a mature conversation here," she told him angrily, her tone steadily getting louder with each word she said. "I'm trying to figure out our problem in a civilised, grown-up way."

"And that involves raised voices?" he asked her.

"Apparently it does!" she told him.

"You're the only one who seems to think we have a problem here," he told her. "Doesn't that tell you anything?

"Yes, it tells me you're a moron!" she yelled. "You and I both know there's a problem with us, and there has been ever since…" she railed off, her cheeks red and a vein pulsing above her eye that made her close her lids against it before the anger seeped back into her. "I'm just trying to talk to you!" she shouted at him.

"Then will you quit with the yelling?" he shouted back. "Because I'm not deaf."

"But you are blind, right?" she accused, her finger pointing at him. "Or was the whole 'us' thing that 'want what you can't have' problem you've had since you we were kids?"

"Oh, so that's what we're discussing?" he asked, his temper rising. "I thought you wanted a conversation, Willow, not an analysis of our past."

"I think it's time we did a little analysing, don't you?"

"Why?" he asked, his arms in the air. "What good is that going to do the situation we're in now?"

"It might make **me** feel a little better," she spat.

"Yeah, it'll make **you** feel better," he said accusingly. "And to hell with what I want, right?"

"You just don't wanna do this because you know you're the bad guy."

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" he asked, eyes wide in disbelief.

"It means that for years you didn't want me, but as soon as Oz came on the scene, there you were, with the snide comments and jealous looks."

"Yeah, because you were so receptive to my relationship with Cordelia," he accused back. "Do the words 'ancient history' mean anything to you?"

"Well, it's kind of hard to understand you making out with someone you've claimed to hate since we were five years old," she told him. "And you know why I was so upset about that."

"Oh, so you can date Oz and move on from you thought you felt for me, but I was supposed to stay single until I realised what an oblivious idiot I'd been all those years and then I was supposed to, what, make with the wistful looks and cry myself to sleep every night because you were with someone else?"

"Yes!" she yelled at him. "That's exactly what you were supposed to do. It would have been justice."

"Well, you'll be happy to know that's exactly what I have been doing," he told her quietly, his head lowering, suddenly unable to look at her.

"Don't lie to me," she told him, shaking her head.

"You're right," he said, a dangerous smirk on his face. "That's all I ever do. Lie to you. Hurt you. I'm the worst friend ever. That's great. It was so nice of you to come all the way over here to point out all of my faults. Are we done? The door's just behind you."

"No way," she told him. "I'm just getting started on you. This is years of frustration being released, Xander. Weren't you the one who was always telling me to stand up for myself when we were kids? Looks like I'm getting the hang of it, what do you think?"

"Well, can we hurry it up a little?" he asked. "Because I think I'm gonna book myself in for a prostate exam so the fun can just keep on coming."

"You don't even care, do you?" she asked him angrily.

"About what, Willow?" he asked, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling and sounding more than a little weary. "If you're pondering my feelings on Spike and Drusilla's recent break-up, no, I don't care about that. If you're asking me if I care about what we did to Cordelia and Oz, the answer is yes. I care a lot. I didn't want to hurt them. I love Cordelia."

"No, you don't," she said matter-of-factly.

"Well…okay, no, I don't," he admitted. "But that's not the point."

"Oh, so you have one?"

"You know, you'd think I would," he said, confusing even himself. "But hey, since you seem to be the expert, you tell me what happened."

"I don't know!" she yelled at him. "That's what I'm trying to understand! We kissed, Xander. More than once. I'm not blaming you for everything that happened, because I was there, too. But I saw the way you looked at me in those few weeks. I felt like I was the most important person in the world to you. You made me feel like you wanted me. Like you had to kiss me or you'd go insane."

"That **is** how I feel…" he told her, but instantly catching himself with wide eyes and a panicked expression. "…T," he added quickly. "**Felt**."

"So, what, now that everyone knows you don't?" she asked. "You just suddenly stopped wanting me? In the blink of an eye, you don't have any feelings of that nature towards me whatsoever? You made me want you again, and then you make me feel like I imagined the whole thing. You haven't even tried to talk to me about what happened, what you're feeling."

"You haven't tried to talk to me either," he pointed out. "When we had that picnic with Buffy at the weekend in the park, when I said it was something that wouldn't happen again, you didn't argue, you agreed."

"What did you want me to do?" she asked, throwing her arms up. "Air our dirty laundry in front of our friend?"

"That night in the factory, you took one look at Oz, and I knew that you regretted everything that had happened between us. Why would I want to put myself through the torment of having you spell that out for me?"

"I care about Oz," she told him. "More than I ever thought I could. He makes me laugh, and he makes me feel special and safe, and I love that about him. He's made me stronger in the short time I've known him. He's given me confidence, he's supported me through everything, and he understands me."

"Wow, Will, he sounds like a great guy," Xander said dryly, forcing the words out through clenched teeth.

"He is," Willow agreed.

"Well, if he's such a great guy, why did you kiss me in the first place?"

"Because something was telling me to take that chance with you, because it might never happen again," she told him sadly. "Because that could have been my only chance to know what it was like to kiss you, and to have you kiss me back."

"It happened more than once," he pointed out. "It wasn't some random event that only happened one time."

"I know," she said. "But I've loved you for so long…" Her eyes widened, and she recovered quickly, even with the furious red that she knew was occupying her cheeks. "…Did," she added quickly. "I **did** love you for so long - as in before, and definitely not now – and I had to see what it was like."

"And?"

"I've had better," she said with a smirk. "And it wasn't like I was the only one feeling guilty about what we'd done. You called Cordy, like, a million times since then. You were at the hospital, you took her flowers, called her constantly, tried to make her jealous at the Bronze. Was I imagining all of that?"

"No," he said desperately. "Cordelia got hurt, because of us. I was trying to make that up to her, to let her know how sorry I was because of it. I'm not really sure where the jealousy part comes into it. Probably a pride thing."

"But you **don't** love her?" she asked sceptically.

"No," he told her. "I don't."

"Well, then, who **do** you love, Xander?" she demanded from him desperately. "Because I think it's time you figured it out."

"You still haven't worked it out?" he yelled suddenly, the words out before he could tell himself not to do this, regretting it even as it left his mouth. "It's you, Miss Brainiac! I love **you**!"

And then there was a moment of complete silence, just the two of them standing there, looking at one another with the words still hanging in the air between them.

Xander's eyes widened, his mouth still open and his face a mask of panic, looking like he had just given away a part of his soul.

Willow stared at him, speechless with surprise on her face, looking like she had gotten her biggest wish.

But only for a split second.

She quickly recovered, her eyes narrowed, and her face hardened. "Yeah, well, payback's a bitch," she said bitterly. "Now you know how you made me feel all those years."

"What?" he asked, taken aback.

"You heard," she bit out. "All those years I spent pining after you…you knew the whole time and you never said a word."

"I—"

"Don't even dare deny it," she told him with wide eyes.

He put his hands on his hips, his mouth half open and face concentrated on her. "Okay," he told her. "All those things Buffy and Jesse have said about me," he said. "About me being blind and oblivious and ignorant of you…I never was," he said. "I couldn't **not** know."

"You just didn't feel the same way," she said, her tone sharp.

"It wasn't like that," he told her, shaking his head.

"It **was**," she snapped at him. "Come on, admit it. I heard you in the library with Buffy that time when you were talking about the dance. You told her I'm not the kind of girl whose lips you think about."

"My god," he said to himself, shaking his head to himself. "If you're going to bring all of this stuff up, you better at least get it right," he told her. "That day in the library that was, like, years ago—"

"Don't be dramatic, Xander," she said condescendingly.

"Yes, because **you're** being so easy-going," he retorted. "And I think you'll find the direct quote was 'She's not the kind of girl whose lips I think about **too much**', emphasis on the 'too much' part. Meaning that I **do** think about your lips, but I **try** not to let it happen '**too much**'. I know that you were hurt when I got involved with Cordelia," he told her. "But what you don't know is that I spent most of my time with her talking about **you**. So much in fact that she threatened to hit me upside the head if I didn't quit it. So much so that she asked me if I was sure it was her I wanted to be with.

"Oh, and while we're dragging up the past," he said, "There's that time with the love spell that went very wrong," he continued. "You know, you, me, and a very thin shirt you were wearing as you asked me to be your first. Do you even know how tempted I was? You heard what I said, 'it's not that I don't find you sexy', because I very obviously do, as the past few weeks will attest to. But no, you were my best friend and I couldn't take advantage of you while you were under a spell. And don't even get me started on when you were in the hospital…"

"What about when I was in the hospital?" she asked suspiciously.

His face paled, eyes wide in regret, "Let's try to stay on topic here!" he yelled.

"You're the one taking a detour into Random Land," she said.

"What I'm saying is," he told her, taking a deep breath to calm himself down, his breathing shallow. "What happened between us…? I regret a lot of things, but that? Not one of them."

"You had a crush," she said. "It wasn't love, Xander. I'm not even sure you know what that means. You've felt something for pretty much every other girl in the world so, statistically speaking, I guess it was my turn."

"It was more than that!" he argued.

"Please! You change your crushes more often than you change your underwear," she told him. "And I should know, I've seen your underwear."

"Hey! The last time you saw my underwear was when we were ten, and you'd pee your pants too if that clown had chased you around the circus!" he said defensively. "And Cordelia was hardly a passing phase."

"Didn't stop you from checking out every other girl, though, did it? You've barely been broken up a week and I've already seen you looking at that new girl Cordy's been hanging around with," she huffed loudly. "She's probably a demon, you know…"

"I haven't been…" he started defensively before he trailed off, looking at her thoughtfully. "You really think she's a demon?"

"If we're playing statistical probabilities…"

He shook his head, back to the matter at hand. "I told you I love you, and you're **still** yelling at me?"

"And what did you want me to do, Xander?" she asked of him. "Did you want me to tell you I'm still in love with you and just melt into your arms like nothing ever happened?"

"That's probably not an offer, is it?" he asked quietly.

Her narrowed eyes was his only response. "I don't," she said coldly. "Loving you was nothing but pain for me. It was heartbreak and tears and pity, and I got over that a long time ago. I had to, because it was killing me. I finally got to a place where I was happy with Oz, and you ruined it."

"Oh, I'm sorry," he said sarcastically, walking around the bed tensely with fire in his eyes. "Was I the only one there all of those times? Was I forcing you to kiss me? You know, for someone who was so happy with Perfect Werewolf Guy, you sure looked pretty comfortable grabbing me in the library. You came here tonight to yell at me, and I get that, but you didn't even consider what would happen after, did you? You said you don't blame me for what happened, but that's exactly why you're here. You're bringing up all of this stuff from the past that's been pissing you off, just because you want me to feel bad and say that it's all my fault so you can walk out of here and beg Wolf Boy to take you back guilt-free, and I'm not going to do that. I'm not going to let you make yourself into a martyr. Admit it, you still have feelings for me, and that's why this has been bugging you so much. You won't even consider what we could have because you're just afraid now that you know there's nothing to hide behind!"

"Sorry to pop your balloon of delusion," she snapped. "But I **don't** have feelings for you. I can't believe I ever did."

"Liar, liar, broomstick's on fire!"

"Oh, that's mature!" she said, looking at him with narrowed eyes. "I can't believe how much of my life I've wasted on you, how much sleep I've lost…" She looked at him, folding her arms across her chest. "And what if I hadn't come here tonight, Xander?" she asked him. "You'd still be laying there, listening to your country music and hiding away from everything, pretending it never happened. Would you have come over to my house and declared these supposed feelings?" She watched him lower his head, the answer obvious. "No, I didn't think so… And I'm the one who's afraid?" she said sadly, shaking her head. "We're friends, and that's all we're ever going to be. That's all I ever **want** to be."

"Are you kidding?" he said indignantly. "After tonight, I'm not sure I even want to be your friend anymore."

"Fine!" she yelled at him, fists clenched at her sides.

"Fine!" he shouted back, eyes wide with rage.

"Idiot!" she hollered as she turned to the door.

"Coward!" he yelled after her.

"Cheater!" she bawled as she opened the door.

"Right back at'cha!" he called back with a smug grin on his face.

"Demon-lover!" she screamed as she disappeared through the doorway.

"Rhymes with witch!" he yelled as the door slammed closed after her.

He could hear her stomping away in fury, the heavy clunking of her sneakers rhythmically hitting the floorboards and reverberating around the house, and probably the neighbours too.

"Damn it!" he said to himself, turning to kick the bed with his bare foot and wincing in pain straight after, quietly cursing as he ran his hands through his hair in sheer frustration, his face contorted in anger.

A second later, the door was thrown open again, and all he saw was a flurry of red hair.

"Screw it!" she said, throwing her arms around him and kissing him so hard that they both fell back onto the bed.

"But…" he started when she finally released his lips. "You said…"

"I lied," she told him simply.


	4. Chapter Four

Xander didn't know what to say, which was a surprise in itself because it seemed to happen so rarely. He couldn't even think of a joke or a pun or a witty comment that could break the moment, and that was what he was best at. She was lying on top of him, all of her weight pressed into his body, her arms around his neck, and all he could do is stare at her. Was he dreaming? It certainly felt like it, because this could never happen in real life, not ever. She was way too smart for this. He was destined to live his life alone and in pain, just like he had always planned, so this couldn't be real.

But just to be sure, he reached one hand to her face just a couple of inches away. He touched her hair, hanging in short curtains around her face, the strands soft and silky to the touch, and he felt the corners of his mouth tug up into a smile as he felt himself release a breath he didn't know he was holding.

"You look confused," she told him, a tender smile on her face.

"I always look confused," he said, the same smile looking back at her.

"Well, yeah," she allowed. "But…more so."

"But…" he said, "Weren't we arguing a couple of minutes ago?"

"Yeah, and…?"

"Just trying to piece together how we got from there…to here…" he said slowly.

"Does it really matter?"

He smiled, a real and true smile, as he held her tightly to him and used his weight to roll her over onto her back, him on his side next to her. He gently shifted her a little, resting her head on one of the pillows at the head of the bed. His hand was caught beneath her weight, warm against her skin, and the other rested on her stomach as he looked down at her.

"You lied?" he asked her, his voice quiet and breaking with tension.

"Yeah," she said softly.

"But what about Oz?" he asked. "I thought you wanted to make things right with him."

"I don't love him," she said. "I wanted to, I really did, but as much as I've tried and hoped it would happen, I can't, because my heart belongs to someone else. I've been close to it, but it's just not there, not like what I feel for you."

"He loves you," Xander told her.

"Yeah, keep on making me feel better, Xand," she said dryly.

"Sorry," he said with a shrug.

"I feel bad for hurting him," she continued, "but if it's a choice between you and him…I'm not going anywhere. You were right," she told him.

He gave a wide grin. "Really?" he asked. "I'm right? Can I get that in writing? It might be the only time it ever happens." She grinned at him, and a blank expression came over his face. "Wait…about what?"

"What you said," she told him. "About me being a coward."

"What?" he said. "No, Will, I didn't mean that. You're one of the bravest people I've ever met, and that includes the vampire slayers. I was just angry."

"You may have been angry, but it was still true," she said. "I've been so mad at you, you know. I thought you were just being Horny Guy and I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time."

"Or the right place at the right time," he corrected.

"Well, yeah, we know that now," she said with a grin, "But I never did consider that you had feelings for me. I should have had more faith in you. I should have known you wouldn't just throw everything away because you were curious after thirteen years of friendship, or for a fumble with someone who didn't mean anything. I should have known that you wouldn't do that to yourself, and you wouldn't do that to me. When you said that you…"

"Loved you?" he offered with a grin as her face blushed red, and he let out a chuckle.

"Yeah," she said, her eyes flickering away from him. "It was like it wasn't real. My feelings for you were always kind of…unrequited, you know? But that feeling was familiar, and I knew exactly where I stood with that. Knowing that you…"

"Love you?" he offered again, and once more came the adorable blush.

"Yeah," she repeated, "You're right, there's nothing else left to hide behind."

"Do you want to hide from it?" he asked her.

She looked over his face, took in the dark brown eyes that made her feel like she might melt if he kept looking at her like that, and the smile that she had known forever. "No," she told him, her voice almost a whisper as she brushed a lock of hair from his forehead. "I don't"

"Good," he said, leaning forward and kissing her forehead gently. "And it's not like you were entirely wrong, either," he told her. "I haven't exactly been Mr. 'Here's-How-I'm-Feeling'. But you have to know that the reason why we haven't talked about what happened is because…I know how happy you were with Oz. I knew that we had done something terrible, but I thought if I stayed away, you could have that with him again."

"You didn't think I'd want to know how you felt?" she asked.

"I didn't think it would matter," he said sadly. "I didn't want you to know, because I didn't want your pity, and I didn't want to risk our friendship after so long. You know that's the most important thing in the world to me, and I thought that just leaving things be would make it go away. If you hadn't come over here tonight, I never would have told you."

"Well, then, it's a good thing that I did," she said with a smile. "So, what do we do now?"

Xander's eyebrows rose immediately, a look on his face that said exactly what was running through his mind at that moment.

"Xander!" she warned lightly with a laugh, her hand tapping his arm gently.

"What?" he asked incredulously. "You say something like that to an eighteen year old guy and you expect them to **not** think about sex? I thought you were the smart one."

"I mean…" she said, "You and me… Is this what you want?"

He smiled a trademark half-smile, his hand gently tucking a piece of hair behind her ears so he could see her properly. "It really, **really** is," he said honestly. "But you and me together…for real…would that work?"

"Do you think I have a crystal ball?"

"You **do** have a crystal ball," he said. "I bought it for your last birthday."

"Well…okay," she allowed, "But what I mean is, I can't see into the future, Xander. I can't tell you that things are going to be okay, that they'll work out and we'll live happily ever after. I wish I could. It doesn't mean we can't try."

"But we're going to hurt people," he told her. "Oz, Cordelia…we've already put them through so much, but if we actually decided to give this a shot…"

"Then at least they'd know we didn't hurt them for nothing," Willow argued. "I'm sick of being the good girl who worries about everyone else and their feelings. I want to do something for **me**, Xander. I just want to be happy."

"You think I'll make you happy?" he asked, a smile on his face and his finger caressing her cheek gently.

She didn't reply. She just smiled, one hand moving to touch his cheek with tenderness as she leaned up, her lips touching his softly. She pulled back, checking his eyes for any sign of regret or confusion, but there wasn't any. Her fingers moved over the skin of his cheek, trembling just a little.

She pulled him down to her, his hand moving to rest on the bare skin at her hip where the shirt had ridden up just a little, his fingers grazing over it and finding it softer than he had ever dreamt it could be. He felt her hand move from his cheek down to his shoulder, then to his chest, resting over his sweater.

"I don't want to lose you," he said, looking down at her sincerely. "Ever."

"You won't," she said. "You can't."

"Are you sure?" he asked.

"About this more than anything," she told him.

He grinned, his arm moving up her side, his hand smoothing over the cotton shirt softly. He brushed over a hint of the curve of her breast, feeling the indent of the her bra underneath unintentionally, and it sent an illicit thrill through his body. He moved his face closer to hers, eyes taking in her face.

"I'm gonna kiss you now," he told her. "If that's okay with you."

"Well, finally," she said with a smirk. "I've been waiting all night."

He smiled again, his eyes crinkling in the most adorable way, as he lowered his head to hers, nose by nose with her, her warm breath washing over his face and making his heart race even more than it had been already.

"Our first real kiss as an actual couple," Willow said quietly. "Are you excited?"

He squirmed a little, trying to hide exactly that. "More than you'd care to know," he told her.

He moved his hand from her side, bringing it up to brush away some hair that had fallen across her cheek. He tucked it behind her ears, his fingers caressing the strands, the feeling familiar yet exciting. He moved his finger to her chin, tilting it lightly to allow him better access to those sweet lips, her tongue running over them nervously and wetting them in anticipation of him.

When his lips met hers, it felt right. It felt special, in the best way, because before when they had kissed, it was illicit and secret and they were cheating on other people. But now…it just felt like things were falling into place, and that made something warm well up in his stomach. His lips left hers, just momentarily, touching them back again to her top lip, and then her bottom one.

She parted her lips, just slightly, just enough so that he could feel the warm pinkness inside, could almost see it behind his closed eyes as he kissed her lips again. Her top lip was caught between both of his, and he heard and felt a tiny sigh escape her.

She was the one who deepened the kiss, opening her mouth just that little bit wider. It wasn't their first kiss, but this was what they had been waiting for all of this time. She felt his hand moving from her chin to the side of her head, the tips of his fingers lost in her hair, the warmth of his touch penetrating her skin to make her cheek blush a bright red just from his contact, and she felt her fingers closing around a handful of his sweater to pull him closer still.

His touch was soft, which seemed strange when the situation felt so intense. She could feel half of his weight on her, pressing against her body and taking her breath away, but then, he did that anyway. He'd always had the ability to make her speechless, and to make her breathless, and to make her lose herself with just one look into his eyes, and she honestly couldn't see that ever changing.

His fingertips lightly stroked at her skin, massaging the curve of her cheek, around the bottom of her ear, and along her hairline. It sent shivers through her, and she opened her mouth a little wider, the tip of her tongue sneaking out just a little to taste him. She tilted her head as his tongue met hers, soft and stroking against one another. They duelled together lightly in the warmth of their joined lips, this kiss something she'll never ever forget, although she was pretty certain that she'll remember every single kiss with him.

She felt his hand move from her face down to her hip again, gripping her there, as he finally disengaged his lips from hers, more for the need of oxygen than anything else.

He looked down at her, eyes lit up with a smile that spread all over his face. "That was…"

"The way our first kiss should have been?" she asked.

"I was gonna go with 'wow', but your way is more poetic," he told her. "And also true."

"That's how I always dreamed of you kissing me," she told him.

"That's how I always dreamed of kissing you," he replied. "Not that I didn't enjoy kissing you before…" he said hurriedly. "But it always made me feel guilty after, and we always had to go back to other people. This is just…right," he told her. "You and me, no one else and nothing to feel guilty about. I like it."

"I **love** it," she said with a grin.

"I love **you**," he told her, one fingertip lightly stroking an exposed spot of skin at her hip and looking at her with awe in his eyes. "Who would have thought that we'd end up together?"

"You mean apart from everyone we've ever met?" she asked incredulously.

"Yeah," he said, "Apart from them."

She laughed, "So, you wanna kiss me again?" she asked.

"Let me save us a little time here," he said, "It doesn't matter how many times you me ask that question, the answer is always gonna be yes."

"Good to know," she said as she looked at him expectantly with questioning eyes.

"What?" he asked, confused.

"Waiting…" she said in a singsong voice.

"Oh, right!" he exclaimed in realisation, his lips swooping down to meet hers.

It was soft and it was gentle and it was hot and it was passion, it was everything all rolled into one kiss. It was something that Xander had never really experienced before, a kiss with someone he was in love with. With Cordelia it was all lust and hurried, and before with Willow was hot and forbidden, but this was new. It was love, of that he was in no doubt.

They parted, and all he could do was look at her, which was good because he loved doing that. His arms came around her, holding her to him, letting her nestle in his shoulder and his neck, her breath hot on his skin, making him feel like she was the one who'd always kept him warm, even in the darkest days of his life. It felt like all he'd ever had to do was look at her, and nothing was could ever be bad, and he placed a kiss in her hair, just for that reason.

"Why did we fall apart?" she asked him, looking up at him with sadness and wonder in her eyes.

"We had to," he told her, his hand coming to her face to brush away the hair falling on her forehead. "We had to fall apart, so we could come back together. We had to go through everything else so we could have this."

"Then I'm glad," she said. "Because I wouldn't swap this for anything."

"Me either," he said with a smile.

Her chin rested on his chest, "What I said earlier," she said, "About not knowing whether or not we'll get a happy ending?"

"What about it?" he asked.

"I was wrong," she said. "I think we will."

"You know what," he said with a knowing smile. "So do I."

The country music played on, the CD he had chosen earlier on loop, as the world continued to turn outside of this room where everything seemed to stand still.

But inside, Xander Harris and Willow Rosenberg were in a very good mood.

The End


End file.
